1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to apparatus for variably accelerating a rotatable drive member and in particular to a decelerating apparatus for receiving a high speed product and delivering it at a relatively lower speed. More particularly, the invention relates to an apparatus for decelerating printed copies received from a folding mechanism which are then to he delivered at a relatively lower speed onto and synchronous with a conveyor belt on which the copies must be laid in a controlled manner.
In printing newspapers or the like, the printed copies are folded by a folding mechanism and emitted therefrom at high speed. Typically, the direction of travel of the emitted printed copy must then be changed through 90.degree. and also the speed of the copy reduced to the lower speed of a conveyor belt on which the copies must be laid in a controlled manner. Thus, there is a need for an apparatus to both receive the high speed copies and decelerate them in a controlled manner and to deliver the slower moving copies onto a conveyor belt in a neat fashion without intefering with the laid copies.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Prior art slow down apparatus bas employed designs to slow down the copies by impacting upon slower moving and or static stops leading to uncontrolled slowing down of the copies which can cause damage. Thus, the slow down apparatus has been unable to achieve the required performance characteristics with controlled copy kinematics. At the same time, the complex prior art slow down apparatus ar both difficult and expensive to produce. There is therefore a need for an apparatus to provide controlled deceleration of the copy.